This might seem like an odd tutorial, but stick with me because it might not be what you think.

A common question that I've been getting is how to withdraw money from MT5. I thought that the answer was straightforward, so I would always respond with something like the following.

To withdraw money from MT5 contact your broker and request a withdrawal. Your broker will usually send you your money back via the method you sent it to them. 

But I found another answer to this question that might surprise you.

How to Deposit Money to Trade

Since this is a tutorial for beginners, let's start with the basics.

In order to start trading Forex, or any other market, you'll need to work with a broker. 

The broker gives you the ability to trade the market you want to trade. They do this by establishing connections to trading exchanges or liquidity providers, and setting up software that will allow you to execute trades via those providers.

MetaTrader 5 is one example of software that a broker could provide their customers. Other examples are:

• MetaTrader 4
• TradingView
• NinjaTrader
• cTrader
• And More!

If you're looking for a broker, be sure to see our list of favorite brokers.

Brokers can accept money in several forms:

• Money wire
• Check
• Money order
• Credit card
• PayPal
• Cryptocurrency
• And more

The method of payment that a broker accepts will be determined by their company policy and the laws of the countries they operate in.  

What Usually Happens With Your Money

When you send money to a legit broker, they will put your money into their bank account and give you access to trade that money on their chosen trading platform (MT5, MT4, TradingView, etc.).

If you want to withdraw money from your account, you simply contact the broker and request a withdrawal. 

They will usually send your money back via the payment method that you used to send it to them. In some countries, they are required to send your money back using the original funding method.

What People are REALLY Asking

Alright, that's straightforward.

So I was wondering why so many people were asking me this question and why so many of them have never heard of a broker before. 

Well, it turns out that there is more to that question than I realized. Here's what some of those people were really asking…

Some shady groups out there tell people that they will manage their money by putting the money into MetaTrader 5.

Now since you already know that you need a broker to trade, and that MT5 is nothing more than trading software, then obviously money cannot be deposited directly into MT5. 

What these groups do is they put the money into their own personal bank accounts, but tell the investors that the money is “in MT5.” 

Since the money isn't deposited with a known bank or regulated broker, the investor has nobody to complain to and the money is gone.

Something similar appears to be happening in this scam. There was another scam back in the day that gave real bank information and they got caught. So saying that the money “gets deposited to MT5,” looks like a way to get around providing any kind of identifying details.

How to Research a Broker or Money Manager

So before you hand your money over to any money manager or broker, do some basic homework:

• What results have others had with them in the past?
• Is that group regulated in the country they operate in?
• Does their social media look legit?
• Check out their website, did they use Google Translate to write it?
• Are there any YouTube videos about the broker or money manager?

Be sure to watch the video above for more tips.

If there isn't any information on the broker or money manager, steer clear.

Remember that there will always be negative reviews about organizations/individuals in the trading space because many customers have unrealistic expectations of how much money they can make in trading. Then they blame their broker or money manager when things don't work out like they thought it would. 

But that aside, does it seem like the organization operates with integrity…or not?

Test Them Out First

Even after you've done a lot of research, never put all of your money in at once. Put in a small amount, then try to withdraw some of it. 

This is the best way to test to see how easy the withdrawal process is and if you can actually get your money back.

Final Thoughts

So those are some things to think about when you first start out in trading.

Withdrawing money from a broker is usually a very straightforward process. But if shady individuals tell you that they will deposit your money directly into MetaTrader 5, always be sure to get clarification.

The post How to Withdraw Money From MetaTrader 5 appeared first on Trading Heroes.

I usually don't like talking about this type of stuff here, because it's generally counterproductive. But this issue affects both you and me, so I'm going to say a few words on it.

The bottom line is that there are shady (to put it nicely) groups out there that are posing as me and Trading Heroes. These groups are promising to manage money and provide fantastic rates of return.

Then of course, when people give these groups money, the money “magically” disappears. 

So I'm going on the record to say that I DO NOT manage money, I have NEVER managed money and I probably never will. I'm perfectly happy trading my own funds. 

If anyone approaches you posing as me or Trading Heroes and says that they can manage your money successfully, then run away…far away!! 

In this post, I'll get into how scams usually work (as best as I can tell) and how you can avoid this scam.

But first, here's my official statement in this video:

Why are They Targeting Me?

Sadly, this type of scam happens to anyone with a public brand.

Some people are too lazy to build their own product or brand, so they have to leech off the hard work of others.

It happens.

But let's learn how to protect yourself against this, and other similar scams.  

How Does the Scam Work?

The way that these things usually work is that they contact you randomly on a platform like Telegram or spam you via email. They pretend to be me and they invite you to a private “Trading Heroes” or “Hugh Kimura” Telegram chat where they try to get you to invest your money with them.

If they are successful in their sales pitch, you send them money, usually via Bitcoin or another method that isn't traceable or refundable.

Once the money is in their account, they string you along for a few weeks, with fake reports of wins and losses.

As far as I can tell, there are basically three methods that they use to keep your money:

1. They tell you that there was a trading error and they lost all your money.
2. They simply stop answering you.
3. They give you a small payout to keep you happy for a short time (paid from the investors after you) and keep stringing you along for as long as possible.

There are probably variations that I don't know about, but you get the idea.

What Can I Do About It?

With most platforms, like Twitter or YouTube, I can just fill out a form to prove who I am, and the platform will take down the scammer's account or content.

I did it with the Adrian Shiroma scam back in the day, when they tried to post fake information about me.

So if they do post anything on platforms that allow a takedown, then I will do everything in my power to get their accounts closed. 

However, Telegram is a little different and that's why these scammers are using Telegram. The difference is that Telegram does not censor any private chats. So even if I complain to Telegram, they won't do anything about it.

This is good policy from a free speech perspective…but not good if someone is running a trading scam.

Therefore, because of this policy and the fact that these groups are private (I cannot find them through a simple search), it's almost impossible to figure out that these groups are operating.

That's why I'm writing this post and recorded that video.

The best I can do is to publicly state my position on managing money, so people can do their own research and find my content. 

What Can You Do About It?

If you're thinking of investing with anyone, it's your responsibility to do your own due diligence and find out if you're truly dealing with a legit money manager or a total scam.

So here are some tips on how to do that…

First, at the very minimum, find referrals and testimonials to find out if anyone has worked with the potential money manger before and what their results were. Is the money manager easy to work with and was the investor able to withdraw money?

Next, email the money manager directly and get on a video call with them. Many scams operate behind faceless Telegram chats, fake Gmail accounts, or Twitter profiles. If you can actually see their face, and you're getting emails from a domain that you know is credible, then that's a good first step to verifying that they are who they say they are.

Finally, find an alternate way to contact the money manager. There may be people posing as him or her on one platform (like Telegram), but you contact them via another platform (like Twitter), and that might be the platform that the real money manager uses.

A phone number would be ideal.

Final Thoughts

I always will do everything I can to prevent these types of scams from spreading. But I do have my own work and trading to do, so I simply cannot monitor this full-time.

Therefore, it's up to you to do your own homework whenever you're considering a money manager. If you do a minimum amount of research, most scams become apparent very quickly. 

However, as I've always said, your best bet is always learning how to trade your own money. When you rely on others, they may not live up to your expectations or they may disappear one day. 

Then you're back at square one.

Work on improving yourself and take control of your own future!

That's real freedom. 

The post Beware of this Telegram Forex Scam appeared first on Trading Heroes.

Almost every trader I have met starts on the wrong end of the trading education process.

Yes, myself included.

The journey becomes too difficult for most aspiring traders, so they give up and return to their cubicles.

That's why the success rate of traders is so low.

But for those who stick it out, the rewards can be tremendous.

To give you the best shot at success, I will show you the three elements of your trading personality that you will have to understand, to get the best results.

…and hopefully shave years off your learning curve.

I'll also show you what will probably happen if you do not work out your trading personality first.

I mention this because I want to help you avoid the pitfalls of learning to trade and also help you understand the importance of figuring out your trading personality early in the process.

What if You Started With the End in Mind?

Many traders get interested in trading because they want to make a lot of money, quit their job and travel the world.

…and that's great!

But therein also lies their biggest downfall. 

They only chase the money and look for the trading method that has the highest return.

…and that works sometimes. Like about as often as Hailey's Comet comes around.

But for the vast majority of traders, that doesn't work and they just end up tired and frustrated.

However, with a little bit of foresight, you can greatly improve your chances of success in the trading game.

The key is to understand what types of trading methods would work with your personality and desired lifestyle.

I think you will be surprised at how many trading strategies you can let go of, once you know what is most likely to work for you.

That leaves you free to focus on becoming a master at just one trading strategy.

Need more return every month?

No problem, simply add more currency pairs, timeframes or trading strategies. But without one profitable trading strategy, you are just spinning your wheels and will probably fail.

That might sound harsh, but it's the grim reality of trading.

Hopefully I have communicated the benefits of understanding your trading personality first. So with that in mind, here are the three pillars of your Trading Personality.

Trading Timeframe Personality

The first thing that you need to understand is your ideal trading timeframe. I call it your Trading Timeframe Personality (TTP).

It will take a bit of experimenting to find out which timeframe works for you. There are basically three timeframes:

• Day trading
• Swing trading
• Long-term investing

You can take a few systems that you learn on the forums and trade them in a demo account.

This will allow you to get a good feel for which timeframe suits your personality and daily schedule the best.

Remember, you are looking for the timeframe that matches you best.

Not the system that makes the most money.

You can usually make more profits by trading more currency pairs or trading more systems. But is it much harder to trade against your personality and daily schedule.

Trading Setup Personality

Along the same lines as trading timeframes, are the different trading setups out there.

There are basically two types of setups that traders look for:

• Technical setups
• Fundamental setups

You might be good at one or both. But the key is to start with just one and master it, before moving on.

I call this figuring out your Trading Setup Personality (TSP).

It is possible to make money as a technical trader or a fundamental trader…or some mix of the two.

My eyes start to glaze over after I read a couple of fundamental reports, so I prefer to stick to 90% technicals and use only 10% fundamentals.

But it will probably be different for you.

If you are more of a technical trader, then you can break that down into three different categories:

• Breakout patterns
• Trend patterns
• Countertrend patterns

Figure out which one suits you best and start there.

You can always add more strategies later, but it all starts with mastering one strategy. 

Trading Risk Tolerance Personality

The third important thing to figure out is your personal risk tolerance.

I'm sure that you have heard many times on the internet, that you should not risk more than 2% of your total account on one trade.

…and this is excellent advice.

But the question then becomes, how much should you risk?

In reality, there is a per-trade risk tolerance that you will feel comfortable with, and you should not risk more than that, or you will see your performance degrade dramatically.

This is your Trading Risk Tolerance Personality (TRTP).

It is actually hard to figure this out in a demo account because you are not risking real money. So I would recommend opening a small live account with $100 and trade nano lots.

After you backtest a trading strategy, you can also use a drawdown calculator to show you how much you should risk per trade, in order to avoid a X% drawdown.

For example, if you would freak out if you lost 20% of your account, but you would be OK at 19%, then put 20% into the calculator.

Next, put in the other stats of your system.

Then play with the risk per trade until your risk of hitting a 20% drawdown goes to zero (or close enough).

The Payoff

When you start your trading journey knowing these three things about yourself, will you give yourself a much better chance of success.

If you know your ideal trading timeframe and market conditions, you can choose the right education that will help you work with your innate strengths and not against them.

This will eliminate a big percentage of courses and mentorships out there and will save you a lot of money. 

When you understand the risk tolerance that suits you best, you can use the risk that you are comfortable with, when you take any trading course.

When you do this, you reduce the chances of blowing out your account and you can stay in the game longer.

You will also have greater confidence in your ability to learn to trade for yourself and that will help you stay away from trading robots and money managers.

Now let's take a look at what happens when you don't commit to your trading and you don't figure out your trading personality.

The Typical Trading Journey

It is a little painful to write about this because I have spent way too long on some of these steps. You can probably relate.

Hopefully, by understanding the common stops on the trading journey, you can avoid the ones that won't help you progress as a trader.

Here we go…

You Hate Your Job and Discover Forex…Among Other Things

It's Monday morning and you are sitting in your desk at work.

“Shit, this sucks,” you tell yourself.

So you start surfing the internet to look for ways out of your J.O.B. and the usual stuff comes up…

• Real estate investing
• Stock trading
• Forex
• Online Marketing
• Futures
• Creating travel videos on YouTube
• Starting your own stripper cam channel
• etc.

Since you found this site, I'm assuming that you picked Forex. You are excited it get started on your new trading journey, so you rush into it.

Here's what happens next…

You Join a Trading Forum or Group

Now that you are committed to becoming a Forex billionaire, you join a free trading group or forum to start learning the basics.

This is actually a great place to start.

You can learn the lingo and get help setting up your software.

The best part is that it's free!

You follow a few of the most active threads and try some of the trading systems.

The forums help get you started, but they are also really confusing.

Some people say one thing.

Others say the opposite.

…and they start to get annoying. Conversations tend to degrade into third grade name calling.

So you look for some real education to move you forward.

You Take Your First Course

Next, you start Googling for a reputable trading course to take. You choose a course based on how profitable the instructor is and if he or she trades professionally.

Things go well for awhile and you are excited to be learning this proven trading system. Learning the system is simple enough and you start trading it in that real money account you just opened.

You Make Some Money

The trading system is working pretty well and you have your first profitable week! This trading stuff is easy, you think.

So instead of risking 1% on every trade, like your instructor recommends, you start risking more.

Maybe 5% on some trades.

But you risk 10% only on trades that you are really sure about.

It won't be long until you turn that $500 into $100,000!

You Blow Out Your Account

Then it happens.

You take too much risk on a trade, forget to use a stop loss and when you are at work…BAAAM!

You get an alert on your phone, telling you that you just had a margin call. All of your trading capital is gone.

So now what?

The Search Begins For a Trading Robot (EA)

You fund your trading account again, but this time you are going to be “smart.”

Since you cannot check your trades while you are at work, you will get a trading robot to take care of your trades for you.

So you get back onto the internets and pick out a couple of Expert Advisors that look promising. You load them onto a VPS and let them rip.

Guess what?!

They actually start making money…in the first week.

Now that your trading income is “on autopilot,” thanks to your EAs, you decided to branch out into other areas of income generation.

At this point, you tell your friends and family that you have finally figured out this trading thing.

You Do the Other Things Too

Remember those other money-making opportunties that you found at the office?

Why not explore those too?

So you start going to real estate investing meetings and even try your hand at online marketing. These activities distract you from your trading and you lose focus.

I call these activities green fairies because they tempt you with the lure of making more money, but they fly away as quickly as they came.

Around this time, your EAs usually starts to crap out.

It usually begins with the robots trading flat.

Losing a few trades, winning a few trades, then losing again. Then they start to lose more money than usual.

What's going on here?

You finally realize that if you don't know how an EA works, you don't know when it has stopped working.

So you pull the plug on your automated trading and re-commit to learning to trade for yourself again.

Welcome to the Trading Silodrome

Thus begins the cycle I call the Trading Silodrome. You jump from course to course and trading system to trading system, in search of your “holy grail.”

This phase can last months or even years. 

Every time you lose money with a trading system, you think that it's the trading system's fault. So you keep paying for courses, hoping that the next one will finally be the one that leads you to the promised land.

Rock Bottom

After awhile, system hopping gets tiring. Right about now, you are at rock bottom and are questioning if trading is right for you or not.

This is where most people quit and crawl back to their cubicles.

Now you have a decision to make…

Admit defeat, or keep going?

You have always succeeded at what you set your mind to, so you keep going…

The Search Begins for a Money Manager

Wouldn't it be great if you could get a professional money manager to trade your money for you?

Instead of having a mindless robot trade your money, you decide to find a professional money manager.

Yeah, that's the ticket!

So you split your remaining risk capital between two traders, John and Roger.

Well, John turns out to be a crook like this guy and last you heard, the authorities were chasing him through South America.

Roger is actually a really good trader. But the technology that copies his trades into your account screws up and you end up losing money, instead of making the 10% that Roger made last month.

You decide that getting a money manager isn't always all it's cracked up to be.

Back to square one.

You Find a Mentor

Determined to figure this thing out, you assess your options.

At this point, you have tried a lot of different things.

So what's left?

Get a mentor of course.

So you look around for the most successful trader you can find and schedule a private mentoring session. It costs $200 an hour, but you figure it's worth it.

The first mentor doesn't work out, so you try another.

Then another.

You are back on the Trading Silodrome again, but this time it's costing a lot more money.

But what else is there?

You Figure Out Your Trading Personality and Trade With It

You are just about ready to give up, then it hits you!

There are some trading systems that you absolutely hate to trade and others that you are sure you could figure out, if given enough time and coaching.

Now you go back through all of the notes that you collected over the years, from your trading courses and private mentoring.

Which ones appealed to you the most? You revisit those and start to learn how to backtest and forward test. You figure out which ones match your personality and lifestyle.

That's when things usually start to click…

But if you did this in the beginning, you could have saved yourself a world of hurt. 

Conclusion

As you can see, starting with understanding your personality, instead of only learning trading systems, can have a huge payoff.

But most traders don't do it that way. I don't blame them, it goes against human nature. It goes against how trading is traditionally taught.

Hopefully, now that you understand the right way to do it, this will help you improve your trading faster.

If you have been through the entire process, is that about right?

If you haven't, then where are you in the process?

Let me know in the comments below…

The post How to Find a Trading Strategy That Matches Your Personality appeared first on Trading Heroes.

I haven’t seen anyone really address this issue directly before.

But I feel that it is something that needs to be understood, in order for you to really get the most out of the best trading education that is out there. You see, you might be avoiding certain educators or courses, simply because the trader does not publish their trading track record.

That can be a huge mistake. I’ll show you exactly why in a bit.

But first, what qualifies me to talk about this? I have been very fortunate to have this blog, through which, I have come into personal contact with many professional traders, some of which I have actually met in person.

As a result of these conversations over the years, I have slowly pieced together these 9 reasons why  legit traders who have courses don’t always publish their track records.

Trust me, there are perfectly valid reasons.

So if you are searching for quality trading education, but are wary of what is out there, I don’t blame you, there is a lot of crap out there. However, let me show you why you should consider all of the possibilities.

It probably is NOT what you think.

While you read this, all I ask is that you imagine for a moment that you are professional trader who has an education business. This shift in perspective will help you understand the following better.

Got it?

Good.

Let’s go…

1. They ARE a Scam

Alright, since you are already thinking it, let's get it out of the way. Most people think that just because a trader doesn’t publish his track record, that automatically means that he is a scam.

That is certainly a possibility and there are a lot of scams out there.

Like this one, for example.

You should be careful. 

With that said, let's dig deeper into the idea of trading scams…

I would like to think that the general public is getting smarter about trading education and that scams are having a harder time surviving. One sign that I see this is the general downtrend in the number Google searches for the term “Forex.”

I interpret this to mean that the general public understands more and more that trading is hard work (just like anything else worthwhile) and they are on to the next “easy opportunity.” While it means that it is harder for legitimate traders to make money with their courses, this also means that the students that they get have a better understanding of what they are getting into.

…and that’s a good thing.

But a scam is a scam, so is there an easy way to spot one?

Can you spot a scam just by their website? Here is a screenshot from a site that someone shared inside our private Facebook group.

It looks like it was designed in 1997. Would you trust that site?

I wouldn't.

The person who posted that site in our group confirmed that the site was a scam and the owners of the site just pounded people with emails to buy trading robots.

But guess what, I know some other sites that are perfectly legit, but are also not so well designed. The first one that comes to mind is the site of this legendary trader.

So before you write something off as a scam, take the time to do some homework.

Talk to people who have actually taken the course. Do a few Google searches on the trader.

Email the trader and ask questions. 

Before I move on, I’ll leave you with one important thought on trading scams:

In life, you will usually find what you are looking for.

If you are looking for scams, you will find scams. OK, so you found a scam…now what?

Does that help you further your trading education? Does that make you a better trader?
No, it just makes you mad, distrustful and probably means that you skipped over a few courses that could legitimately change your life.

Focus on finding quality trading education and you will probably find it. Do some due diligence, of course, but after that…sometimes you have to take a risk and get the course.

Just like in trading, it’s all about the risk reward ratio.

2. They Don’t Trade

Your knee-jerk reaction might be to lump these non-traders in with scams. I was in the same camp for a long time.

How can anyone who doesn’t trade at all, teach trading?

But one tweet from Adam Jowett made me reconsider.

Think about it this way…let's look at some famous coaches in the sports world.

Scotty Bowman – The NHL coach who has more wins than any coach in history. But he stopped playing hockey as a teenager, after a stick to the head severely hampered his playing ability. See more legendary NHL coaches who were bad players here.

Clyde Drexler – Two-time hall of fame NBA player. Member of the Dream Team. Only lasted two years as head coach of the University of Houston. Never coached at that level (or higher) again. See more legendary, non-player college basketball coaches here.

So before you write someone off as a bad coach, just because they don’t trade…stop yourself for a minute. They still might have something valuable to teach you.

…as long as they disclose that they don't trade. Of course, if they lie about not trading, that's another story!

3. Unrealistic Expectations

Now let’s get into the more “behind the scenes stuff” that you probably won’t hear about on most blogs. OK, imagine for a minute that you are a trader that can double your account every 1-3 months.

It is possible.

There is Paul Rotter, of course. But he has a different type of advantage.

On a smaller scale, I know of two traders who can do this FX and Futures. They are both women. It’s a very, very (very) rare talent and most of the best traders in the world cannot create this type of return.

This is because success is all about trading within your personality.

But even if you are a man, let’s just say that you can do this. Now if you are going to teach someone to trade your method, what if they “only” make 20% a month?

That is still world-class.

How about 15% a year? Still better than most fund managers.

But it’s not 100% a month.

See what I mean?

If you give students the expectation that they can trade like you, then they might be deeply disappointed, even if they are doing really well by anyone else’s standards.

…and that defeats the purpose of trading education.

It is a valid reason for not publishing a track record.

On the other hand, you might be an ultra conservative trader and make 10% a year, but with very low drawdown. But maybe your system could produce much bigger returns, if traded by another trader.

So why limit the potential of your students by thinking that they will make 10% a year, when they are capable of much more?

4. Legal Reasons

If a trader is full-time, chances are good that they probably manage money or trade for a fund of some sort. There can be a clause in their contract that prevents them from disclosing their trades.

This is to protect the clients of the fund and the fund itself. If you ran a hedge fund, would you want your traders broadcasting all their trades over Instagram?

Hell no.

Then you will get phone calls from armchair quarterbacks asking why a trader got into that trade or this trade. It would be a client relations nightmare. Funds need to protect their sanity and intellectual property and that is why they prevent their traders from showing their trades.

Makes sense right?

I have to give Walter Peters credit for pointing this out to me on our podcast.

5. Unnecessary Headache

Publishing your track record comes with certain obligations. There are always going to be people who second guess your trades or will want to brag that they traded better than you during a particular week.

Who needs that headache?

Legit educators are usually traders first, teachers second. Dealing with hecklers only takes time away from trading and building quality education products.

6. It Might Not Matter For Marketing

I met up with a professional trader that I had known for a long time, in San Francisco. We mostly talked about trading and education.

He mentioned some unexpected results that came from publishing the track record of one of his students. This student is a fantastic trader, his best student ever.

So naturally, he thought that publishing the track record of this trader would help sell training courses. But guess what?

It didn’t. Sales were exactly the same when he showed the track record, compared to when he didn’t.

If that is the case, then why bother to got through the trouble of compiling the results?

7. Too Many Trading Methods

Like I have mentioned before, there are different trading personalities.

Some traders stick to one method…

Others trade many.

If you trade 15 different strategies, imagine trying to sort through all of them, especially if they are in one account. You would have to label them, print the chart and write up an analysis for each method.

That’s a full-time job in itself. This method can help, but is it worth hiring someone just for that?

Usually not.

8. Messes with Their Trading Psychology

This one is huge.

When you are on a losing streak, it can be tough enough. But when people are looking at your track record and telling you: “why should I buy your course, you had a terrible week,” that can really mess with your head.

To protect your sanity as a trader, some things just shouldn’t be published. Again, it depends on your personality, some people are resistant to this type of criticism.

But generally, it is a good idea to eliminate as much bullshit as you can.

9. Personal Privacy

Then there is the issue of personal privacy. Some people just don’t want others to be all up in their business.

To take it a little deeper, if you are a successful trader, publishing how much you make can make you a target. This is especially true if you have a family.

I heard about one guy who got his watch collection stolen after he published it on Instagram.

Of course, this is going to be rare, but it can happen.

There are a lot of crazies out there.

Final Thoughts on Publishing Trading Track Record

All that being said, is there anyone who does publish their trading track record?

Sure, there is.

If you absolutely need to see trading results, I would recommend checking out Joel Kroeger.

He has a live trading journal where he publishes his trades and running performance, and you can even get an email when he closes a trade.

Another trader that I follow is Tim Sykes.

He really is pushing the level of trading transparency and is a trader/educator that I really respect. While you are on the Profitly site, also check out Fatbeetrader.

He is a FX trader that does very well.

So I hope you now see that the fact that someone doesn’t publish their track record, doesn’t automatically rule them out was someone who can help you trade better. Yes, there are a lot of people out there who have bad intentions, but if you only concentrate on finding the best (and stop trying to expose everything as a scam), you will usually find it.

Do your research. After you start talking to educators, traders and students, and you will usually get a feel for who is legit and who is not. 

Did I miss something? Let me know in the comments below! 

Disclaimer: Some links on this page are affiliate links. We do make a commission if you purchase through these links, but it does not cost you anything extra and we only promote products and services that we wholeheartedly believe in. TradingHeroes.com is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

The post 9 Reasons Trading Educators Don’t Share Their Track Records appeared first on Trading Heroes.

The bottom line is that by calling something a scam, we waste our precious time and mental capital on an endeavor that does not positively affect our trading.

I feel very fortunate to have this blog.

In general, the people that I have crossed paths with in the trading world have been nothing short of amazing. People like Walter Peters, Colin Jessup, Adam Jowett, Chris Lori, Rafael Veron, Chris Capre and many, many more have given me inspiration, support and guidance, many times at crucial points in my life.

This blog post is the result of conversations that I had with a couple of these traders.

No matter how legitimate a trader or educator is, there is always the tendency for people to say that they are a scam. I think this goes for any topic that deals with money. Through my contact with these traders, I feel that I have become quite good at spotting the real deal and a fake.

I'm not saying that I will be 100% right, but I can usually sniff it out after a few questions.

But should we be overly concerned with exposing scams? When we do this, is there more going on than we realize?

In this post, I invite you to take a deeper look into the idea of what is a scam and is not a scam. I think you will find that the extremes are very clear cut, but still a very, very small piece of the pie. There is actually a whole lot of gray in the middle.

Much more than you may have thought.

To take it one step further, I believe that your readiness to call something a scam is actually detrimental to your development as a trader.

Real Scams Exposed

Let's get this out of the way first. Yes, there are some straight up scams out there. And yes, you must protect yourself against them.

A recent one that comes to mind is the kid who said he made $72 million dollars trading stocks. He was featured in New York magazine and became famous overnight. It turned out that he never made a dime and all his profits were made in a paper trading account.

I guess it wasn't that bad because he didn't actually take any money to invest. It wasn't right, but the worst that probably came out of this was that his friends won't give him money to go on a beer run anymore.

Then there are convicted ponzi scheme maestros like Bernie Madoff, Lou Pearlman and of course, Charles Ponzi himself. These were gigantic scams that defrauded investors of millions of dollars. This is the scary stuff that you really have to watch out for.

There are also smaller players who do pretty well for themselves, at least for awhile. If you remember the Adrian Shiroma story, he was pretty pissed that I exposed his scam and started doing all kinds of fun stuff with my picture on the internet.

I actually got an email a few months ago from a reader who gave me his alleged real name and said that the authorities are chasing him through the DR somewhere.

More on that in a bit…

My point is that there are some real scams out there, so I'm not saying that they don't exist. You do have to be careful. However, I believe that calling something is a scam is the worst thing you can do for your trading career.

Not Scams

Then there are people who have really honed their craft and are super reliable from an education and/or trading standpoint. For the purposes of this post, they are boring.

They are fine upstanding members of society and are certainly what real trading and education is all about. But sometimes, even these people can get pulled into the gray area.

If not by actual trading or education performance, then by pure public perception.

Bottom line…find out for yourself. Talk to their students.

The Gray Area of Exposing Scams

Now we get into the area where investments and/or people may or not be a scam. Generally post people lean towards thinking that someone is a scam, for whatever reason. Before you jump to conclusions, really think about the nature of trading and education.

A Bad Year

Trading has its ups and downs. That is a given.

A trader can simply have a bad year. It happens to the best of them. It probably happens to you. Sometimes there are also events that are out of a trader's control.

‘Nuff said.

Too Much Pressure

One of the professional traders I talked to said that it is fairly common for a good trader to start managing money or a signal service and begin trading poorly. They simply don't handle the increased pressure well.

Could this be classified as a scam? I don't believe so.

But that doesn't mean that they aren't basically good traders or educators. Rafael told me this story in our interview, of a woman that he raised money for because she had an amazing track record. She could double her account every one to three months, like clockwork.

But she was only trading a $10,000 account. When she got more money (much more) to trade, she couldn't handle the pressure. She almost lost the whole account before getting back to breakeven and returning the money to the investors.

Was she a bad trader? No way.

She just wasn't mentally prepared for the stress of the bigger dollar amounts. The same could go for a trading educator who isn't prepared for the mental stresses of a signal service. You could still learn a lot from them as an educator, but their recent track record could suck because of the added stress.

So before you call someone a scam, take a look at what is really going on behind the scenes. It may not be what it appears to be.

You Don't Have To Be A Good Trader

This can be a tough pill to swallow and I must admit that I used to be against any advice that came from someone who wasn't trading for a living. But the fact of the matter is that someone doesn't need to actually be a good trader to help people trade well. They just have to have a good understanding of what trips traders up and how to fix it.

To give you an example from outside of trading, take a look at the NFL. In 2009, Mike Tomlin became the youngest head coach to lead his team to a Super Bowl victory. But he has never played professional football. His experience consisted of playing wide receiver for the College of William and Mary.

Similarly, Bill Belichick is one of the most successful coaches in the history of the NFL. He only played Division III ‘ball at Wesleyan University in Connecticut.

So don't ignore trading psychologists and coaches. They can probably teach you a thing or three.

A Scam Is Ultimately Your Responsibility

Yes, scams are completely your responsibility. If you got scammed, it was up to you to do your research on the investment or education and take the proper amount of risk.

So the next time you call something a scam, check your ego at the door. In order to call it a scam, you must have conclusive evidence. If you are in the very large gray area, then it is on you to do your due diligence and limit your risk.

If the risk is too high, simply walk away.

Yelling “scam” from the rooftops is a waste of time and only helps a few people who were thinking of investing their money with that particular scam.

Why not use that time to yell “this is awesome” about high-quality trading products? That will help more people find something that actually works. 

Conclusion

The bottom line is that by calling something a scam, we waste our precious time and mental capital on an endeavor that does not positively affect our trading. A good example is the Adrian Shiroma story.

While writing about the scam and ultimately bringing it down did help a lot of people out, it consumed a lot of my time and I was very concerned about the type of stuff that they would write about me on the internet.

Luckily the scammers were hacks when it came to creating anything online, but it was still mentally draining to file another DCMA every time they put my picture up somewhere else. I was better off focusing on improving this site and creating better products.

Similarly, when you waste your time bashing something/someone for being a scam, you waste your time and do not keep your mind open to the possibilities. By quickly shutting out these opportunities, you limit your ability to learn and grow.

So simply decide if an opportunity is worth the risk or not and don't go all-in.

Only put a small portion of your total capital at risk.

Even if you are completely sure about the opportunity, don't let an unforeseen event like the recent Swiss Franc tumble cripple you.

If you did your best to research an opportunity and it does turn out to be a scam, then you take an acceptable loss and move on. Just like a Forex trade. Hopefully you learned something from the experience.

Calling something or someone a scam too quickly can cause you to miss out on excellent opportunities and introduces a negative, poverty-based mentality into your psychology.

Remember that there can be a lot more going on behind the scenes than you may realize.

Stay positive and understand the risks.

You attract what you look for.

What do you think? Let me know in the comments below…

The post Why Exposing Trading Scams is Killing Your Trading Results appeared first on Trading Heroes.

In my search for excellent trading strategies, I keep an open mind and review as many methods as I can.  This strategy caught my eye, so I thought that I would document the testing process here on the blog.

This will be a multi part series. In this first part, I will explain the trading method and show you how to setup the forward and back test.  The second part of the series will show my results from the testing. Finally, the third part of the series will evaluate how to possibly improve on the results.

I'm not sure if this method will work or not, but that is why we test.  The great thing about this method is that it is available publicly, so I can show it to everyone and you can do your own tests.  I've tried to make this post as detailed as possible so you feel comfortable doing it yourself and so you can apply the process to other strategies that you come across.

But before we get started, here are a few things that you have to understand…

Why I Am Writing These Posts

• My goal is NOT to discredit any of these trading methods that I feature.  I'm done trying to expose scams.  I strongly believe that it is a much better use of my time to uncover excellence.  The methods I feature are strategies that I feel have a good chance of being profitable systems.
• I feel that there is a huge gap between free trading strategies that are presented on forums/blogs and what is required to figure out if the trading method is viable and if it fits a trader's personality.  I want to bridge that gap with these posts.  Instead of jumping in with real money in the beginning, these posts will show you the safe way to get started.
• To stimulate meaningful discussion from people who trade these methods with real money.
• I want to uncover the best trading methods in the world.  Deconstructing and writing about trading methods helps me understand them much better.

Keep These Things In Mind

• Of course, past performance does not guarantee future results
• I don't have any affiliation to this strategy.  The only things I know, I have read from their website.
• Backesting and demo trading is much different than trading real money
• Even if you give the exact same trading system to 10 traders, you will get 10 different results.  That is the nature of trading.
• Not all trading methods are testable.  Very discretionary systems are difficult to test and some are downright impossible.  If a trading method is more discretionary, testing might not be an accurate measure of its profit potential.
• I only test methods that are provided for free on blogs and forums.  I do not take strategies out of paid courses.
• All information is for educational purposes only.  It is not trading or investment advice.

Now that we have that out of the way, let's get down to it.

Presenting The Urban Forex CCI Divergence Breakout Strategy

The CCI Divergence Breakout Strategy is courtesy of Urban Forex.  It is a trading community created by Navin Prithyani that is based on a core set of Forex trading strategies. Their trading methods are provided for free as a lead for their Forex Watchers training website.

First, we need a plan. Here are is the testing plan for this strategy.

Testing Plan

The first thing you need is a testing plan.  Here are the parameters for my first test.  You can test on any pair or any time frame above the 15 minute (according to the Urban Forex website), but I want to provide a concrete place to start, so I have picked a specific time and pair.

• Currency Pair: EURUSD
• Indicators: Commodity Channel Index (CCI), 14 period
• Time Period: Daily
• Entry: Conservative

Entry

As the name suggests, this is a strategy that looks for divergence between price and the CCI indicator.  For a long entry, price must be trending upwards and CCI must also trend upwards, then bounce. After a CCI bounce, connect the lows in price with a trendline.  Once price breaks the trendline, wait for a retest of the trendline from the underside.  Look for a closed candle that bounces to enter the trade.

Do the opposite for a short trade.  I will provide chart examples of both long and short trades at the end of the testing plan.

Stops

The Urban Forex site says to set the stop, depending on how steep the trendline is.  The steepness of the trendline can really depend of how your chart is setup.  Since I'm not a big fan of subjective rules like this (at least not on the first test), so I'm going to set a rule that is going to use the more conservative stop.

Therefore the stop will go one pip above the nearest swing low, for a long. At the close of each candle, move the stop to one pip below the low of the last candle, for a long.

Do the opposite for a short trade.

Profit Target

Use two lots.  The longer term target for the second lot should be the next 00 or 50 level.  This should be at least a 1:1 reward to risk ratio. The first profit target should be at 1:1 reward to risk, if it is less than the 00 or 50 target.  If there is less than a 1:1 ratio on this first profit target, do  not take the trade.

Exit

If the first profit target is hit, then exit at the nearest 00 for 50. Otherwise, stay in the trade until the stop is hit.

Examples

Here is what a long trade would look like.

This is a short trade example.

How To Setup A Backtest

Since this trading method is so simple, it is easy to setup a backtest.  Open your favorite backtesting software.  I use Forex Tester, so I'll use that as the example.

If you want to see how to setup your first Forex Tester backtest, read this tutorial. Once you setup your backtest, come back to this post to see how to test this strategy specifically.

Next click on the List of indicators icon to add an indicator.

Then add the CCI indicator to the EURUSD chart.

Make sure that it is set to 14 periods.

When you see a trade setup, first calculate your stop loss.  Then make sure that your 00/50 target is at least equal to the number of pips in your stop loss. If it is not, don't take the trade. Follow the rest of the rules outlined above for each trade.

Use a risk spreadsheet to calculate the number of lots to trade.  You can create one yourself, or you can download one below for free.

If you want to create one yourself, here is the calculation.  First, figure out your maximum dollar loss, based on a percentage of your account.  For example, if you have a $5,000 account and you only want to risk 1% per trade, that would be $50 of risk.

$5,000 x 0.01 = $50

Then calculate the cost per pip, based on the lot size that you set up above.  If you are using my settings, then the cost per pip will be $0.10.

This is based on a lot size of 1,000 currency units.  If this is confusing, just follow my settings and do a test.  You will start to get a feel for the numbers.

Also compare your results in backtesting to the results in your demo account.  That will help you adjust your backtesting settings, if necessary.

Multiply your cost per pip by the number of pips of risk.  So if your stop loss is 100 pips, your total dollar risk by your cost per pip.  In this example, that means the following.

100 pips x $0.10/pip = $10 risk per lot

Then divide the total risk by the risk per lot to get the number of lots.

$50 / $10 = 5 lots

So you should trade 5 lots in this example.  That would allow you to only take 1% risk of your total account on the trade.  The calculator spreadsheet in the download section will help you do this easily or you can create one yourself.

How to Setup A Forward Test

Now do that same thing in your broker's trading platform.  Since most people use Metatrader, I'll use that as an example.  The CCI  is a default indicator in Metatrader.  Add it to the Daily chart of the pair you backtested and monitor the signals.

Next, setup a free account with MyFxBook.  This website will connect to your demo account and collect your trading results.  Follow their documentation to connect your account.

It will give you reports that tell you things about your trading results that would otherwise take a long time to do manually.  To learn how to use MyFxBook, watch this video.

Downloads

Click on the button below to download the Risk Calculator Spreadsheet and Strategy Template for backtesting.  It will make it easier for you to do your tests.

• Risk calculator spreadsheet – Calculate the proper lot size for each trade
• Backtesting worksheet – Write down your plan so you don't deviate from it.

Conclusion

Once you have everything setup, you are ready to start testing.  Keep in mind that you should test this method on as much data as possible.  The more data you have, the more likely the strategy will work in different market conditions.

So if this strategy interests you, get started right now!  Don't hesitate.  Regardless if you have backtesting software or not, everyone with a computer can start forward testing right now. Everything you need is in this post, you have no excuses.

In the next part of this series, I will show you the results of my testing.  Stay tuned to find out what happens.  If you want to subscribe to blog posts via email, you can subscribe at the bottom of this page.

If you would like to take a publicly available trading strategy from a forum or blog, test it, then write about it, feel free to contact me.  I may feature your test here on Trading Heroes.

What were your testing results? Share them in the comments below.

Disclosure: I do get a commission if you buy through some of the links on this page. But it does NOT cost you anything extra, it helps pay for my hosting costs and a portion of the proceeds go to my charity partner.

The post CCI Divergence Breakout Strategy Testing Plan – Version 1 appeared first on Trading Heroes.

I want to start this post by thanking all of the readers out there who helped unravel the Adrian Shiroma Forex scam.

When I checked on the site back in January of this year, I discovered that we did enough damage that the scammers finally took the blog down and stopped operating under the name Adrian Shiroma.

Your help has saved many people from losing a lot of money.  Here is an example of the comments that I have received:

“hello. thanks for the info i was about to let this guy to manage an forex account but luckily i google it firs .” – Eric

Now that this Forex scam has gone the way of the dinosaur, lets dissect it and see what you can look for in the future to do your due diligence before investing your money.

Obviously Faked Videos

 The first post that I wrote about Adrian Shiroma wasn't as serious as maybe it should have been.  At the time, it was so obviously a scam that I didn't see how anyone could fall for it.  I didn't think that they would be around for long either.

Boy was I wrong.

This is the only video that they used in their marketing and after watching this video, that was the point where I decided that this was a scam.  The deception is mainly built around the fact that Adrian Shiroma is supposedly Japanese and they are primarily marketing to Spanish speakers.

They thought that they could pull a “lost in translation” on potential clients.

There could be a legitimate Trader that does this, but if you do run into this situation, it is pretty easy to spot the scam.  I do not speak Japanese, but when I watch the subtitles, they do not come close to matching what the woman is saying.  For example, when “Shiroma” comes up the the subtitles, you should hear her say Shiroma within a sentence or two.

Never happens in the video.

In addition, this video was posted EVERYWHERE.  I found this video posted on the usual sites (like YouTube below), but it also came up on video sites in other countries like Russia.  Total video spamming and a big tip off.

Here is what I mean:

The bottom line is: review their marketing material carefully.  Everyone makes a mistake and there are bound to be typos, but when you see such blatant discrepancies like in the video above, that is a huge red flag.

Broker Shenanigans

As I wrote about in my post about Mitsui FX, take a careful look at the broker(s) that a Trader is using.  What the Adrian Shiroma guys did was put all these reputable brokers on their page, then they sneaked in their fake brokerage, Mitsui FX.

Here is a screen shot:

This makes things look legit, but when it came down to depositing money, you didn't have a chance to deposit with anyone else except MitsuiFX.

When I Googled: “MitsuiFX broker review” I got nothing.  Not even a bad review.

That is the first sign that a broker is a fake.  Even the best brokers will have bad reviews, there will always be disgruntled Traders who want to blame their own shortcomings on their broker.

But when there are no reviews, then you will need to do more digging.  If no one on the forums has heard of that broker, then you should stay away.  Yes, there is a chance that it is a totally new legit broker, but wait until they have built up some credibility before doing any business with them.

Things to look for on a website

A bad website design, a scam does not necessarily make.  The Financial Education industry is notorious for being behind the curve when it comes to pretty website designs.  Some of the best educators out there have sites straight out of the '90's…spinning dollar signs and all.

But there are certain elements of a website that could tip you off.  In the case of Adrian Shiroma, he was using a free Blogger blog.

Really?!!

Do you really want to be giving thousands of dollars to a person who cannot afford the $75 a year to host a site?

What using a free blog also does is provide anonymity.  They do not have to register a domain under their own name.   Again, there are some quality, legit blogs out there that do use free blogging platforms, but the ones I have seen do not ask for thousands of dollars.

Another thing to look for is small weird things in the design.  In the case of Adrian Shiroma, their broker's website had an unusual gap in the menu where they used to say that they were NFA regulated (and had to take it out).

Here is the screenshot:

Not something that you should jump to conclusions with by itself, but when added to the overall picture, it can be a clue.  Also look for weird things like converting your money to a weird currency before you get to trade it.

The Adrian Shiroma scam made you convert to Bulgarian Lev (BGN).  Totally suspicious.

Incomplete signup process

I never tried the sign up process myself, but a couple people emailed me and they said that it lead to a dead end.  They were also not able to download Metatrader or the broker's proprietary platform, which should be a major tip off.   Especially when it obviously says “MT4 Trading Platform” on the website.

A broker should be falling over themselves to give you a trading platform and get you started with a demo or live account.

I'm not sure how they got any customers with an incomplete sign up process, but they probably did some filtering on the back end before contacting their potential investors.

Unverified Trading Results

It is not always possible to verify a Trader's performance, for a variety of reasons.  But if someone is posting their performance to a site like MyFxBook and you do not see the two green checks at the top of the screen that it is a verified account, then you know something is up.

Getting an account verified is not that hard.  Here is what Adrian Shiroma's account report page looked like:

Notice the two red X's at the top.  This simply means that they could have taken any ol' Metatrader report and uploaded it to MyFxBook.

Another thing to watch out for is reporting systems that seem to be like MyFxBook that say an account is verified, but it is really not.  Their definition of “verified” may be different.

Here is what the MyFxBook blog has to say about account verification.  Other sites may not be as strict.  I have my doubts about sites like FXStat, but I know MT4i is another good reporting site.

So if they are posting their trading results, be sure to check for these things.

The Biggest Lesson I Learned From this Scam

Besides the above, I learned a few things myself.

Fighting these scammers is a pain in the ass.  They started using my picture as the face of the scam and I was able to take most of them down from the major US websites, but there are still a few sites that I cannot get my picture removed from.

I started a site called AdrianShiroma.org to try and document the scam and keep it off this blog and that probably helped, but it was time taken out of my busy schedule to set that up.

This group of scammers is plugged into a few websites that have a very high ranking, in spite of being total spam factories.   As a result, they are able to get some fake articles and pictures about me ranked highly in Google.

They have made several fake images of me and posted them on these sites.

By looking at these pictures, both you and I know that these are totally fake because the pictures they used are just stolen from my public social media profiles and the pages they are on have nothing written on them.

The articles are equally ridiculous.

On the bright side, I firmly believe that there is not such thing as bad publicity.  So anyone with even the slightest bit of curiosity will follow the trail and end up with the full story on this blog.

Free publicity.

But other people jump to conclusions easily, including potential business partners, potential girlfriends and the like, might not understand what is going on and take it at face value.  I could live with that if I was getting a bounty for each scam that I took down.

Unfortunately, I'm not.

Conclusion

So going forward I'm not going to be blogging about these scams.  I have thought long and hard about this and it really pains me to say it, but it is better for both you and I.  On one hand, exposing these scams helps a lot of people save their hard earned money.

On the other hand, exposing these scams takes a lot out of me, both physically and emotionally. That energy could be better used towards creating useful content and products for this blog and towards my trading.  I am only one person and I need to conserve my time and energy.

It's not worth the headache.

However, I hope you learned a few things from this post that will allow you to spot a scam in the future. I think that in spite of the hassle to me, this is valuable information.

I know for a fact that this scam has popped up under another name and will probably continue to do so as long as those guys are alive.  They have also tried to attack me with viruses via email and Twitter.

It will be a never ending cycle. 

I'm not going to get caught up in the negative mentality, let's focus on the positive.

The best thing that I can do with my time and energy is create the best Forex content on the internet and help you become a successful Trader.

This will have a greater impact on the world by empowering you (and others around the world) to become more self sufficient and I believe that in turn will attract more people away from these scams.

The post 5 Simple Ways to Spot a Forex Scam appeared first on Trading Heroes.

If you haven't been following the Adrian Shiroma story, read the other installments on this page.  It started pretty ordinarily…they spammed this blog…I wrote about my findings.  Our friend Dragonportis helped out with a few big tips on what they were doing.

But now it is personal…threats against me and I have proof that Adrian Shiroma is not a real person and is a Forex scam.

The Proof

Apparently, we have been screwing up their “business” in a major way because now they are making direct threats against me.  Here is the email that I got from them on Sunday.

Nice, to the point and they give exact numbers.  Well, at least they are giving me 48 hours to comply.  How considerate of them.  They even gave me my own email address: KimuraDead@yahoo.com.

But seriously, check out the second to last line in the email…

“…we do not exist.”

Yeah, kinda figured that already.

And what is the ultimate threat besides “Kimura Dead”?  That they will start using my name as the name of the scammer.

I wonder what they have in mind…oh wait, let me guess…

“Adrian Shiroma” writes crappy articles and puts my picture into it

So they started another free Forex blog on WordPress and started using my picture as the picture of Adrian Shiroma. Here is a printout:

Writing slander against me

They also started writing all kinds of bullshit about me.  This is just an excerpt of the full article that shows up when you search for my name.  Gotta love the misspellings and the totally made up information.  Of course, I was not arrested for this and having a wife and kids is news to me.   If nothing else, this has taught me that I need to tighten up the search engine results for my name.

I especially like how Cyr Circle is not a street anywhere in Hawaii.  Good one guys.

What I'm doing about it

I filed a DMCA with Google, but I was largely ignored.  It seems like they will not get involved if there is questionable legality.  I also filed with WordPress, but they still allowing pictures of me to be posted in that blog.  It is tough to combat these bastards because they are from another country.

What prompted the email in the beginning of this post however, was my posting this on the Forex Peace Army forum.  They are the biggest Forex scam reporting website on the internet.  According to one of the Moderators, FPA had a similar issue before and many other scammers have done the same since.

Here is his response to my post:

Thanks to the folks at FPA for their support. So prepare to see a hundreds of fake articles written about me…soon.

The bottom line is that this is more of a pain in the ass and a waste of time than anything else.  But do you know what?  The story has to be told and we have to stop these scammers!

And they are giving me something to write about.  So I guess there is a silver lining.

What can you do?

If you have a blog or are a journalist, write up a little something on Adrian Shiroma and this scam that is apparently coming out of Bulgaria.

Do you know of other Forex scams that are going down?  Tell us about it below…

Hope your week is going better.  Now back to trading.

Cheers,

– Hugh

###

Photo: *saxon* via Flickr Creative Commons

The post Death Threats, Slander And Proof That Adrian Shiroma Is A Forex Scam appeared first on Trading Heroes.

The scamster Adrian Shiroma apparently has a new broker.  I'm not too sure what happened to MitsuiFX.com, but that domain is now redirecting to Shatori.com.  This is just the latest development in the ongoing story of this “Spanish” scam.

The original report that I wrote on Adrian can be found here.  Then I found out from a Trading Heroes reader that Adrian is using a broker called MitsuiFX.  You can read the looong post with the evidence of why I think it's a total scam.

Then recently, Dragonportis alerted me that MitsuiFX has been changed to Shatori.  Just out of the blue, doesn't seem to be any explanation.

Let's see what they are up to now…

Here is what the old MitsuiFX website looked like:

Here is what the “new” Shatori website looks like:

Adrian didn't even bother to change the design.  There is even the big space next to “Regulated” where they had to take out the “NFA” part.  Why not, Adrian is still running his blog on a free Blogger blog.

I never noticed this before, but there is evidence that this is a scam out of Bulgaria.  Super sketchy that you have to convert your USD to BGN (Bulgarian Lev) every time you deposit and withdraw. But they do make it easy to “make a deposit” via credit card.  How convenient…for them.

Check it, this is on the “Live Accounts” page:

Our friend Dragonportis from the last post even went so far as to try to sign up for an account.  Here is what he found:

Interesting, what is the angle?  Identity theft?  Not too sure.

Finally, here is what Adrian's website looks like now.  He changed the terms a little, but the idea is the same.  Just for the record, that account that he is tracking with MyFxBook is up +117% as of today.  But it is still NOT verified.  This text has been Google Translated for us English speakers:

I'd like to think that they have had to make these changes because of what I am writing, but I'm not sure.  Anyway, that is the latest news…stay away!

I haven't heard from all the spammers from the first post in awhile.  Where are all you guys now?

UPDATE (10/12/2012): The scammers have now resorted to writing totally false articles about me online, saying that I have been convicted of unspeakable acts.  I'm working on getting them removed, but I have struck a nerve and these guys mean business!

###

The post Adrian Shiroma Is At It Again, This Time With Shatori appeared first on Trading Heroes.

Back in January of this year, I wrote a post about a trader calling himself “Adrian Shiroma.”

If you missed it, check out the post and why I believe that Adrian Shiroma does not exist and is a Forex scam.

I wrote that post a little tongue-in-cheek because I didn't expect much to come of it.

But I was very wrong…this scam keeps getting bigger and bigger.

Here is the latest…

About about a month ago, a Trading Heroes reader alerted me to the fact that Mr. Shiroma is now promoting a broker called MitsuiFX and believed that the broker is also fake.

Here is the actual comment:

Now, in all fairness, this comment is anonymous, so I dug a little deeper.

If you go to the GoDaddy whois webpage and look up mitsuifx.com, this is what you currently see:

Notice that they look like a legit Japanese company.

Also note that they created the domain name in 2010, but their website says that they have been in business since 1998.  Why so long to get a website?

There is also something interesting when you Google: “whois mitsuifx.com.”

This page shows that the website server is located in Australia.

Why would a Spanish-speaking, Japanese guy with a “Japan-based” company choose to host in Australia?

Here is a screenshot:

What I did next

I checked out the Adrian Shiroma blog and saw the Mitsui FX badge.

This is a current screenshot and as you can see, Mitsui FX is listed among some legitimate brokers.

I'm kicking myself for not getting a screenshot of the blog at that time because Mr. Shiroma had Mitsui FX slapped all over the place and there was a custom banner.

But that is not all, it gets much better.

After that, I naturally checked out the mitsuifx.com website and it was (and still is) ugly.

As you probably know, that is one of my criteria for spotting a forex scam.

But I could have been wrong, so I looked for more clues.

The thing that stuck out on the website was that they said that they were NFA regulated.

I mentioned that in my reply to dragonportis.

Here is what the website looked like with the NFA number.

Notice the “NFA Regulated” link at the top and the NFA number in the footer.

From there, I went to the NFA website.  They allow you to check on any regulated broker on their broker information page.

I entered the NFA number shown above and found that NFA number to belong to MITSUI BUSSAN COMMODITIES USA INC.

This confused me for a minute. Could this really be legit?

I did a name search for “Mitsui” on the broker information page and discovered that MITSUI BUSSAN is owned by MITSUI & CO. Ltd.

Interesting…so I surfed on over to the Mitsui & Co., Ltd. website.

As you can see, they are a huge legitimate multinational company based in Japan.

Maybe I was wrong about MitsuiFX.

But wait a minute…

MITSUI BUSSAN is not listed as an approved Forex broker.

Here is the screenshot from the NFA website.

They are listed in commodities and futures, which makes sense because they deal a lot in raw materials like iron and steel.

So what the hell are they doing operating an FX brokerage when the are not registered with the NFA?

It was not adding up.

“We don't have a FX division”

At that point, I was stuck.

This was probably a scam, but I couldn't tell where the snake oil was spewing from.  Was Mitsui & Co., Ltd not following the rules?  Or (the more likely scenario) was MitsuiFX illegally using a legitimate NFA number?

Then I saw a phone number.

Listed on the NFA website was an address (New York) and phone number for MITSUI BUSSAN COMMODITIES USA INC.

So I figured, what the hell?

I called the number and the conversation went a little something like this…

Mitsui guy: Hello, Mitsui

Hugh: Hi, can I speak to someone in your FX division?

Mitsui guy: We don't have a FX division

Hugh: Well, I'm on a website called mitsuifx.com that shows your NFA number.

Mitsui guy: What's the number?

Hugh: 0231324

Mitsui guy: Yup that's our number, but that isn't our website.  What's the domain again?

Hugh: mitsuifx.com

Mitsui guy: OK thanks, I'll get this checked out.

I'm just paraphrasing but you get the picture.

My hopes were sky high

I got off the phone that day thinking that Mitsui & Co. Ltd. would use their vast resources and legal eagles to squash and scamsters at mitsuifx.com.

When I checked the site a few days later imagine how disappointed I was when I saw this:

As you can see, all my phone call did was get the “NFA” removed from the menu and the NFA number taken out of the footer.

The only good thing that came out of this was that this was proof that mitsuifx.com was not a part of the legit Mitsui & Co. Ltd.

Any company that has to illegally use a NFA number is probably a scam.

As dragonportis also astutely pointed out, Mitsui FX also made their logo look like the Mitsui & Co. Ltd. logo.

But the scam must go on…

Unfortunately, Mr. Shiroma is not your average shyster.  He is a stubborn fucker. Here is how he gets around not being “NFA regulated” anymore.

He now offers two different accounts on his blog.

I have used Google Translate on the page so we can all understand.

The banner is a picture, so cannot be translated, but reading the text at the bottom will give you the information you need.

The first and more highly visible banner is for his “Dukascopy account.”

Obviously Dukascopy is a legit broker, so this makes Adrian look like the real deal.

But 30% commission for only a 10% return and a 50,000 EUR minimum?!

You will understand why when you see this…

Just below the Dukascopy banner is this banner.

Ahhh…there is good ol' MitsuiFX.

This account has a much lower minimum deposit, promises 25% per month and only charges 15% commission!

It's a no-brainer, right?

I have a feeling that if you try to get into the Dukascopy account, they will tell you it is full and will try to get you into the MitsuiFX account.

You are probably wondering what is up with LibertyReserve.

I haven't looked into that because this post is getting pretty long as it is, but I have a feeling that it equally shady as MitsuiFX.

If you have any information on LibertyReserve, let me know in the comments below.

But here's the kicker…

Adrian's “trading results” are supposedly posted on MyFxBook, a trade reporting system that I also use.

However, there is one difference.

When you click over to his trading report from his blog, this is what you see:

Notice in the upper right corner that the Track Record is not verified and neither are the Trading Privileges.

Why is this important?

Because false trading reports can easily be uploaded without these safeguards.

Here is the official statement from the MyFxBook blog.

Whew…that is all of the information I was able to dig up on Adrian Shiroma and MitsuiFX since my post in January.

I know that you will never fall for this, but I hope that by putting this information out on the internet, it will save some people from losing their hard earned money.

A special thanks goes out to dragonportis for the heads up and help with providing details!

What do you think?

Is this a scam or not?

Do you have any personal experience with Adrian Shiroma?

If you believe as strongly as I do that this is a scam, be sure to share this with as many people in the FX community as possible!

It will be tough to get any US agency to do anything because they are operating outside of the US, but if this information makes its way to the right people, it could bring down Adrian Shiroma and MitsuiFX.

UPDATE (10/12/2012): The scammers have now resorted to writing totally false articles about me online, saying that I have been convicted of unspeakable acts.  I'm working on getting them removed, but I have struck a nerve and these guys mean business!

The post Is MitsuiFX a Huge Scam? You be the Judge appeared first on Trading Heroes.

My biggest pet peeve is all of the Forex trading scams out there.

Forex is one of the best markets to trade and these slimeballs take people's money before they ever have a chance at becoming successful.

The reason that there are so many scams in this market is because Forex was unregulated for a long time. Until about 2010, you could manage other people's money in the Forex market without a license.

Think about those possibilities.

Anyway, there is a certain individual that came up on my radar recently that is a perfect example of how Forex scams are set up. Hopefully this post will help beginners avoid such unscrupulous individuals.

For people who take things literally, I'm not actually telling you to do this.

I hate people like this!

The following is my way of making fun of how badly some of these scams are set up.

Step 1: Create a Fake Name and Back Story

The first thing that you have to do is create a believable name and compelling life story.

In this case, I came across a “person” named Adrian Shiroma. Luckily for Adrian, he is Japanese/Spanish, so most English speakers cannot understand his website enough to realize that it is BS.

I'm not even going to give the website the gratification of a direct link, so you can Google the name if you want to check it out.

Step 2: Setup a Free Blog

Yes, if you want to scam people out of millions of dollars, there is no need to spend $100 and get a real domain name and website hosting.

Just setup a free blog on Blogger or WordPress. Nobody will know the difference.

If you Googled the name, you will see the blog that I am talking about. He even uses a free Hotmail email account.

In all fairness, there was a very small chance that he is a real person, so I sent him an email. After all, I have been known to be wrong in the past.

So this is what I said…

No surprise, but I didn't get a reply.  Probably because he speaks Spanish…yeah right!

There is a “track record” on his homepage going back to November 2009. But if you actually go back through his blog posts, they only show records going back to March 2011. That is half-assing at it's best.

The actual currency pair and prices are mysteriously blocked out and somehow the account always starts with $30,000 in it.

Hmmm….

In addition, there are is no account name or number on the statements that are posted.

It looks like a random report from Metatrader that could have been done in a demo account.

Step 3: Create buzz

Now go out and spam as many Forex blogs as possible. Here are the comments that were left on my blog:

I left out the email address and IP addresses because I actually give a shit about privacy. However, they were all from the same email and IP address.

But they were clever and used different names. Important point there, be sure you are taking notes.

When looking around for proof that he won the Traders Marathon, I couldn't find it.

No surprise there either.

Great idea though.

In addition, if you Google Adrian Shiroma, there are a bunch of “interviews” on different websites like Baby Pips and Forex Banks. Well, actually it is the same interview, posted in different places.  Another key point, get the maximum mileage from your crappy broken-English interviews.

One funny thing is that if you look on his blog, he spams his own blog! There are multiple comments that are exactly the same.

Apparently he had some videos too, but most have been taken down. That is one area that you can improve on. Be sure to make quality videos.

However, I did find one on YouTube and it is pretty funny. I don't know Japanese (in spite of my name and 6 years of Japanese School) or Spanish, but I'm pretty sure that she never says Shiroma at any time in the “broadcast.”

Look carefully at the subtitles…you will see Adrian Shiroma come up a couple of times in the text, but she says “Yamanaka.”

The final thing to look for in the video is at about 0:53. The name Adrian Shiroma comes up with the Japanese characters under it, but they are wrong.

If you do a quick search for the Kanji, this is what Shiroma should look like.

Hmm….

Step 4: Take the money

Now, this is the easy part. Just get them to send you money.

I'm not exactly sure how he does it because I never got that far, but I'm sure it is pretty easy.

There you have it!

That is all it takes.

Pretty sad huh?

Why I posted this

Ordinarily, I would just ignore the spam comments on my blog. But in this case, the scammers did put in a little effort into this, so I want this to show up in Google alongside the name.

Actually, I want this post to outrank him for his own name!

Of course, experienced traders will recognize this as a scam right off the bat.

But beginners may fall for it, so…

Avoid Adrian Shiroma!

UPDATE (10/13/2012): There have been two more updates in this story with even more incriminating evidence, read them here and here.  Also I just found out today that they are writing false articles about me on the internet, saying that I have been convicted of unspeakable acts.

This, of course, is NOT true and is a weak attempt to get back at me for this article.

The post The Anatomy of a Half-Assed Forex Scam appeared first on Trading Heroes.